#it's a hard job to be a dad

[todaysanother]

inspired by Queen Charlotte: a Bridgerton Story (2023) (x)

[vaguely-concerned]

thinking about not only the specific people lucanis pulls in to represent the 'locks' in his psyche, but the storytelling that happens in the structure/order of them. the underlying ideas are presented something like:

the lucanis who went into the ossuary never came back out again; he died down there (the boy caterina raised is gone forever) -> you're putting yourself in danger doing this (by being close to me), you should leave because I can't bear it if you get hurt because of me -> it doesn't matter even if we do try this, it won't work anyway (again because of me) ('you know what he's like, you can open the door but he won't walk through it' :'( oofie doofie) -> what if the real secret is that there was never anything but the monster in here from the beginning. you should leave, there was never anything here worth saving in the first place. (implicitly: what if I deserved what happened, all along.)

it runs pretty cleanly from outward-oriented attachment anxiety ('caterina won't even want me back like this, she won't recognize me (the same way I no longer recognize myself)) and gradually deeper inwards until we reach self-image and self worth. or you know, the harrowing basic lack of it lol.

"careful -- they'll know we're not right," spite says in one of their first scenes... but clearly, some very deep part of lucanis has feared or suspected for much longer than that that there's something inherently not right at the core of him, way before any demon entered the picture. and the voice he gives those lines to is the person who should know him better than anyone in the world, who he has loved more than anyone in the world -- and who deliberately chose to hurt him so horrifically anyway. 'It's better if I'm just a monster and deserved what happened than it is to allow for the idea that the brother I love doesn't really exist and maybe never did'. it's better if he's fundamentally flawed in some way that needed fixing to help him survive, and that's why caterina chose to hurt him again and again -- out of love. (this one I think he might have a very sad wakeup call on one day if he ever ends up with the responsibility and care of a child of his own in some way and realizes just how alien the idea of ever intentionally hurting them for any reason is to him. oh buddy. also interesting that he keeps caterina as the outermost lock -- there IS a distance he keeps there that he hasn't with illario. he doesn't resent her 'anymore' he says, but he also keeps her carefully further away from his deepest self.)

as far as I could tell the only note in the mind prison that's fully hidden and needs to be uncovered is the sad painful helpless stupid little truth that even after all this, even knowing what happened... he still loves his brother. is there anything illario could ever do that would make lucanis completely stop loving him, do you think? sometimes the trouble with unconditional love is that it is, well. unconditional, even when some terms and conditions probably would have been in order haha.

that's the pattern you see there again and again; he would rather destroy and abandon and imprison himself at every turn than let go of love, even when it's just scraps, even when there's only ever enough of it to hurt him. it's only when rook shows up and as it were takes his hand and walks along with him that he can entertain the idea of changing the story of what walking out the door might mean in the end.

[pixlokita]

I was crying from pain at the emergency room and the nurses were bitching about me not dying so they couldn’t help right away even if I kept passing out and had been there for a long time, this sweet old Russian lady who was also admitted since earlier stood up and walked next to me and kept comforting me and asking how I was holding up, she kept checking in on me and being so sweet and going around asking if everyone was doing ok or just distracting family members of patients with nice conversations. She called out the doctors and nurses for not caring, she sat next to me and kept making sure I was ok and then gave me her phone number when she got discharged so I’d follow up with her. Honestly my day coulda been hell today but this one lady made it so bearable it’s not going to be remembered as a bad horrible traumatizing time, I got to meet an actual angel and I’m so happy about it.

[heybiji]

double life

[anghraine]

jenndoesnotcare replied to this post:

Every time LDS kids come to my neighborhood I am so so nice to them. I hope they remember the blue haired lady who was kind, when people try to convince them the outside world is bad and scary. (Also they are always so young! I want to feed them cookies and give them Diana Wynne Jones books or something)

Thank you! Honestly, this sort of kindness can go a really long way, even if it doesn't seem like it at the time.

LDS children and missionaries (and the majority of the latter are barely of age) are often the people who interact the most with non-Mormons on a daily basis, and thus are kind of the "face" of the Church to non-Mormons a lot of the time. As a result, they're frequently the ones who actually experience the brunt of antagonism towards the Church, which only reinforces the distrust they've already been taught to feel towards the rest of the world.

It's not that the Church doesn't deserve this antagonism, but a lot of people seem to take this enormous pride in showing up Mormon teenagers who have spent most of their lives under intense social pressure, instruction, expectation, and close observation from both their peers and from older authorities in the Church (it largely operates on seniority, so young unmarried people in particular tend to have very little power within its hierarchies). Being "owned" for clout by non-Mormons doesn't prove anything to most of them except that their leaders and parents are right and they can't trust people outside the Church.

The fact that the Church usually does provide a tightly-knit community, a distinct and familiar culture, and a well-developed infrastructure for supporting its members' needs as long as they do [xyz] means that there can be very concrete benefits to staying in the Church, staying closeted, whatever. So if, additionally, a Mormon kid has every reason to think that nobody outside the Church is going to extend compassion or kindness towards them, that the rest of the world really is as hostile and dangerous as they've been told, the stakes for leaving are all the higher, despite the costs of staying.

So people from "outside" who disrupt this narrative of a hostile, threatening world that cannot conceivably understand their experiences or perspectives can be really important. It's important for them to know that there are communities and reliable support systems outside the Church, that leaving the Church does not have to mean being a pariah in every context, that there are concrete resources outside the Church, that compassion and decency in ordinary day-to-day life is not the province of any particular religion or sect and can be found anywhere. This kind of information can be really important evidence for people to have when they are deciding how much they're willing to risk losing.

So yeah, all of this is to say that you're doing a good thing that may well provide a lifeline for very vulnerable people, even if you don't personally see results at the time.

[oensible]

My personal 9/11 of the state of sharks rpf (incl. of fic posts narrativitzation everything etc) is that every time i see anythi f about paternal relationships its almost always macklin when EYE think klim kostin has way more interesting media uotes about his father except most of the meat is in russian articles so you gotta google translate them. Rick being a public figure and his son being a 1oa pick making them more famous than this ex highly ranked prospect that stopped being highly ranked like half a decade ago is my downfall

[officialbruciewayne]

The thing that was the most expensive in Bruce's life, that had cost him the most dearly was control. He needed it. Needed it worse than breathing- each exhale cutting sharper - needed it like it could pull apart the strands of a life. It was the cost of staring at Joe Chill's dead body. It was the cost of disappearing from Gotham overnight. It was the cost he had impressed most on his children.

What we feel in here- Bruce's heart was a bat trapped in a cage, shrieking and flashing wings, fast-paced -he touched a hand over his chest. What we feel in here, we don't take out into Gotham. We don't give it to other people. We don't hurt. If we hurt, we don't, we don't.

Selina was leaving. He'd asked her to go. He'd told her he didn't love her. Couldn't love her. Not the way she wanted. Not the way he wanted.

Another failed relationship, Bruce concluded. Something the children would come to their own conclusion when they saw that he'd left her crying alone in the drawing room. But for now, he'd shelter them as best he could from Bruce's latest pearl in a necklace of mistakes.

He wasn't exactly the picture of mental health; and deep pain came out heavy, blunted and wishing it had a gun to shoot out Joseph Chill's brains. That was the monster not allowed in Gotham. And it was not allowed in the Cave, and certainly not around his children.

Breathing too fast, shoulders rising and falling, Bruce locked himself in his room. And then because that would never keep them out, shouldered his wardrobe- a heavy, old, expensive thing -until it was in front of the door. He couldn't put the security shields down on the windows without signalling the cave, but he could lock and secure them with one of Tim's expanding bo staffs.

That might keep the kids from worrying.

Or at least from getting in.

Long enough for Bruce to suddenly, control ripping out between his teeth with a roar of grief, lunge for the nearest object- a mirror over the desk. He picked it up, ribs singing with sore pain, and threw it across his room.

Alone.

Alone. Alley.

There was no method to it. Nothing meticulous. Just taking apart the room piece by piece, snarling and sobbing and keening.

Alone. Blood. He'd done everything- done anything- except be honest. Admit to being broken- wood splinters jammed in the heel of his hand, and he snarled aloud. Taking only a moment to bite them out with his teeth, before resuming the brutish, unexamined punching of his own things.

Wanted to exhaust himself. Wanted to curl up in the wreckage, panting and coated in sweat, no longer needing control. Remembering how even just a week ago, he had been so frantically desperate not to be alone, he had offered his body up like an apology.

How saying the words had been beyond apology: what was he thinking. He didn't need authenticity, didn't need to be a person, didn't need to be- words like aromantic, words like asexual, words like I can't love anything, I can't have what my parents had, is this how I was made or what I was made?

Exhaustion didn't come, only destruction. Only Bruce Wayne throwing a violent tantrum after a break-up he should have seen coming. Only trying to break anything but someone else. Knuckles bleeding, but numb as a boy in blood, Bruce just- he gave up. Dropped down onto the floor of his room. Knelt in the wake of his own faults and dropped his head into his hands.

G-d he hated himself.

[grapecaseschoices]

i'm fucking bored. time for kendis fashionboard.

[brown-little-robin]

it's not good for the job search to have a fundamental, bone-deep certainty that the world will always punish an honest attempt >:|

[pastelchad]

Sekaiichi hatsukoi is so much fun bc the tyrannical boss who takes their job way too seriously and the new employee who doesn’t know a damn thing is such a relatable concept and you can plop the entire cast into whatever au you want and it would still work just as well

[yardsards]

how to explain to your parents that you can't move back in with them because every time you're near them a big part of you buries itself and you're not sure how long that part can stay buried before its hidey hole becomes its grave?

...without offending them, of course

[beneathsilverstars]

oh my god my wife’s dad has always been weird about them being polyam, like the gay thing is one thing and the trans thing he could ignore but he did not understand polyam and did not want to. but this year he addressed the christmas card to all three of us - including using my wife’s chosen name - and the card design itself was something about a messy, full home being better than an empty, clean home. so that’s definitely a purposeful message and i’m so so happy for my wife that their dad’s come around 😭😭😭😭

[hood-ex]

wait idk anything about the tevis’— why would tommy tevis call dick his son? would you be willing to give a quick rundown

After Dick failed to get himself incarcerated, he became an enforcer for a mob boss named Tommy Tevis. Tommy took Dick in and made him part of his family. Tommy considered him an honorary son and thought very highly of him.

Nightwing (Vol. 2) #107

He even told Dick that everything he had (his home, his reputation, his family, etc.) was Dick's as well. Lynette, Tommy's wife, told Dick that Tommy would let Dick do anything. The whole family loved Dick, including Tommy's 15 year old daughter, Sophia. Sophia actually had a crush on Dick, but Dick acted like an older brother to her, helping her with her homework and such.

While Dick was away from the family for a few days, the cops busted into the Tevis's home. Lynette got killed in the gunfire, Tommy got taken to jail, and Sophia got taken in by the state.

Dick, while mentoring Rose, broke Sophia out of the state home. He got Sophia to help him with the mob. Then, when Chemo fell on Bludhaven, Dick saved Sophia and left her with Amy. When they reunited at the hospital, Dick asked Sophia to leave the mob behind and join a boarding school.

So, yeah, that's Dick's relationship with the Tevis family.

[blujayonthewing]

if my dad doesn't want me to be mean about her stupid soon-to-be-ex wife she needs to quit telling me things istg

[cheerfullycatholic]

The dishwasher caught fire too. First the oven, now this. I think our house wants to burn down at this point and he's more than deserved it. He should've burned ten years ago lol 🥲

[bumblingbabooshka]

Tuvok & Janeway both strike me as people who insist they aren't rich* but then they bring up a summer house or something in casual conversation *note: I'm aware that Star Trek humans live in a post-scarcity world with no money but still. I can't help but see the truth and the truth is that Janeway's fridge had an ice dispenser.